What have YOU done to Embarass your Cobra?

[CSX 4027]

Before I start ant car now I scream to myself "NEUTRAL" as a reminder. I raced my 427 down pit road a. I beat it!!

[Excaliber]

Steve,,,well there you go! If it had been a small block it would'a got away. ha ha

Ernie

[G.R.]

Not again Ernie--sheesh

[flipper35]

Shopping downtown my wife and I get back into the car just as two of the business owners come out to see it. Lets hear it! Go to start it and all I hear is zziinng. The starter wouldn't engage. Had the two guys push start us.

Better yet, I was adjusting the clutch on the lift and went through the gears with it running to make sure it was working properly when I dumped the clutch thinking it was in neutral. I still have two 18" black stripes on the lift. I was glad I caught it before it drove off the front. That would have been hard to explain to my buddies. Hey, can you come over and help me lift the car back on the lift, I kinda drove off the wrong end.

[Blake Olson]

drove the car with Weld Pro Star wheels, prior to getting my compomotives...hope she will forgive me one of these days!!

[65 Blur]

Went to pick-up the car in Sacto with a trailer on the Suburban. Had to unhitch it to lower the back of the trailer enough to clear even with the long ramps. I had the previous owner drive it while I guided him up the ramps. As the front tires came off the ramps and started up the trailer, it pushed the tongue right into the back door of the truck. Pushed it in a couple of inches.

I was so excited to see it going on the trailer, and the prospect of finally getting it home, that I really did not care.

I think the Cobra was having second thoughts about it's new owner.

]

[CSX 4027]

Load up to go racing.
Attach my 20' enclosed trailer to my pick-up.
Get on the highway and begin to climb up a steep incline.
I reach down on the seat and find I am holding my hitch-pin...
Just lucky, I didn't lose the whole deal

[Ron61]

I started out for a drive and got about 15 feet out of my driveway and the car stopped. While trying to figure out why it wouldn't run, four other cars stopped to look at it and they were all telling me what a great car it was and I was trying to fake it that I had stopped there on purpose. Finally after about 5 minute of bull shi--- my way out of that embarassment I remembered that I had turned the fuel pump off while doing some work. Flipped the switch back on and started right up and drove away. I think the people that were talking to me and looking at the car believed me. At least I hope so.

Ron

[jams]

I was letting my car down from the jack stands slowly and I started hearing creaky noises. I assumed it was the normal noises you hear from suspension etc. I neglected to move one of my jack stands completely out from under the car so the car’s radiator was now resting on the jack stand. The “normal noises” I was hearing was my radiator denting do to the weight of the car. No worse for wear unless you look at the dent under my radiator.

Jim

[Edley Rondinone]

OK. Here's my story: Turning left at a stoplight. 8:00 AM. Made the turn, then SOMEHOW, the car kept turning left and started to spin. It spun 270 degrees across a center turn lane, and across BOTH lanes of oncoming traffic, finally stopping three feet from the curb. Fortunately, there was NO oncoming traffic! This was right in front of a high school buddy's auto repair shop, and he was standing outside the shop, talking to a customer, when they heard this roaring/screeching sound, and saw my whole E-Ticket ride! I started the Cobra up, and continued my merry way! I stopped and talked to him later that morning, and both he and his customer thiought I put on a pretty good show!

[Hal Copple]

last fall, at the huge Charlotte AutoFair, at the Speedway. Hot, had driven up from SC for the event, parked at the Olthoff's Superformance display. Thousands of folks admired my and other SPF's there. At the end of the day, cimbed in, strapped on all five points of the Simpson, and with probably a hundred people standing around to watch it actually start up, cranked the engine.

All the "winter" gas had boiled out of the carb, and flooded the engine. It would not start! I cranked and cranked while they all watched, then Dennis Olthoff leaned over and whispered to me "hold the throttle all the way down to air it out".

So i did, in a few more turns it fired up with black smoke out the pipes, then it leaned out, and i motored away.

I had forgotten that a flooded engine from a boiled carb needs air to get the raw gas out of the cylinders.

There have been many moments i have let the Great Stroker down.

Like the time.....

[Jamo]

Hal

I wondered when you were gonna weigh in on this thread. I was thinking the Nurse Nazi story myself...

[kobrabob]

I got several. None with a Cobra.

1. I'm at the 1/4 race track in my 67 GT500 staging at the light and went over, backed up, waited for the x-mas tree to light up and did the coolest burnout in reverse you ever saw.

2. 16 years old, out in my 68 GT500 conv, top down on Holloween night. Drove by a crowd of kids. Pelted by no fewer than 2 dozen eggs. Never got the egg smell out of the car. Years later, still finding eggshells.

3. Saturday night and take my wife out for cruise in my 70 Boss 429. Stop at one those 50s style drive-in, you know, the kind where all the other local gearheads hang out. Time to go so I start it up, put it in reverse, clutch pedal slips, Z-bar, fork, spring and a handfull of other parts fall to the pavement. Didn't have a flashlight but I got it all back together by braille before asking anyone for help. Never went back there.

4. On my 67 GT500 again, carbs acting up, catch on fire. Quickly and confidently pull out an extinguisher out of my trunk. Oh, did I mention this was at night at a busy intersection. Push on the extinguisher's handle only to find out nothing comes out. Panic starts, ripped off my shirt and fan the flames even higher. By now gas is running down the side of the engine on fire. Some guy jumps out of his car with a COUCH PILLOW and start beating my engine and the fire just gets bigger. Finally a good samaritan pulls out his fire extinguisher and puts out the inferno. Found out in the following days that the nasty yellow powder from his fire extinguisher is gritty like sand. Wore out the piston rings. Oh well, good excuse to rebuild the engine anyway.

Lessons learned.

bob

[Bud Man]

Driving down the road, watching oil pressure and temp, water temp, and it goes kaput...

A 42 gallon tank and I ran out of gas!!!!

Whooda thunk I was only getting 8 mpg???

Now, I keep it topped off. Say, if I lived in California a fill-up would be close to a C note....wow

Yours in $1.49 a gallon Texas...

Bud

[KobraKarl]

Wilf told the only cobra one ,that many of us ,i'll bet have done ,make a suave entry with a small croud of onlookers and pull up looking "non chalaunt" and grind the oil cooler shroud into the curb.........eeegh

so how bout an early GT mustang one;

I'm 17 and my pal and I go to a place out in the country called "good time Charlies" a topless bar , he looks real old for his age and they dont care anyway. so we order a couple pitchers and check out the "old broads"... at at the end of the second one I turn to my freind ..and all I see is the back door slowly swinging closed I look to my left and notice two county sherffs standing at the front door checking out the talent...and I lurch out the back before the door can close.

I discover quickly I need a little more seasoning as a drinker but we are both scared sh!tless and minutes later we are roaring down the back county roads and Im peering over the steering wheel through the bottom land fog and I can see an orange blinker reflecting off the fog...my damn turnsignals are malfunctioning ,I'm fidling with the switch and my headlights and trying to control the car when I see a familiar flashing in my mirror....but when i look up I cant beleive what im seeing....................there is a fireball behind my car four feet wide and six feet long.....I am just passing a house so I charge into the driveway ,pop the bubbling hood and pour three beers on the engine to no avail ...I start running around the guys yard looking for a hose...cant find one...I start beating on his door (its about one in the morning) after a minute some poor old guy comes to the door in his robe and I'm screaming at him to get a hose get a hose while my engine flames three feet high in his front yard....he dosnt seem to feel the urgency ,goes back in the house and comes out the garage with a hose five minutes later........the carb was a lump of molten aluminum on the manifold.

and thats how I got a "hypo"

[Tinker51]

When the shipping company delivered my car the driver backed it out of the trailer and shut it off. He put the truck back together and drove off. I jumped in the car, started it up and let it idle for a minute or so and then it died and would not restart. Took about ten seconds to remember the fuel pump switch. Turned it on, hit the key and nothing happened. Took about two minutes to figure out the neutral interlock (which I guess by luck I was in neutral the first time). Not an auspicious begining but it has been great since then.

[KobraKarl]

Ok,

how many of you in the first weeks of ownership had your car inexplicably die as you were tooling down the road..............and how long was it before you figured out your left knee bumped the key off..............prize for anything more than ten minutes

[Jim Werth]

After just finishing my cobra I took my son to his allergist appointment. While driving past a park loaded with kids playing soccer, My car just quit. All the kids are looking at the car. I'm just trying to get it started. My son walked to his appointment about a 1/2 mile away. After trying everything I finally figured that I'm out of gas. Gas gauge was on 1/4 on a tank. Had to walk about a 1/2 mile back to a gas station. Borrowed a gas can and walked back. It was about 90 degrees out. Got back and put gas in while all the soccer kids watched. Always one smart kid in the bunch, he had to ask if I ran out of gas after I put the gas in and restarted it. Jim

[Whaler]

"Wilf told the only cobra one ,that many of us ,i'll bet have done ,make a suave entry with a small croud of onlookers and pull up looking "non chalaunt" and grind the oil cooler shroud into the curb.........eeegh"

Funniest part about "non chalaunt" is trying to somehow make it look like you meant to do this..........LOL

Christ these are getting good.....I am p>>>>>g my pants laughing so hard at these stories!

I used to love pulling a show in front of a thumbs up crowd when the wife wasn't expecting it. A little cooker or even snatching second.....Apparently watching the "passengers head snap back and forth and then give me the what for" is pretty damn funny too.

Oh man this is killing me.........I can picture all these stories.

Keep em coming!!

[Edley Rondinone]

Sometimes the passenger door pops open as my chassis flexes; kinda hard to look like I mean business with a door flopping in the breeze!